Martin Collinson

Did you ever have a Grey Plover look at you like it doesn't believe a word you're saying?

An Otter casually crossing the sands on Holy Island this morning

Here we go. DNA from poop of Sykes's Warbler from Girdleness last week ('IR04') is to no one's surprise exactly that. Iduna rama with 100% statistical support, to exclusion of all other species. #scottishbirding @birdguides.bsky.social @britishbirds.bsky.social

Poops from the recent Shetland Egyptian Nightjar yielded DNA. Not much genetic difference between nominate (eastern) and saharae (western) subspecies, but Shetland bird is likely nominate; DNA is like birds from Oman and Kuwait. #birds #birding #birdingscotland @birdguides.bsky.social

Yellow-browed Warbler in the sunshine in the back garden 😍😍😍

Sykes's Warbler at Girdleness is doing a science - pooping for Scotland. #birds #birding #birdingscotland

It's that time of year in the back garden.

Bird Photograph of the Year. A juvenile Long-tailed Skua on the sea off Newtonhill in the rain this evening #birdingscotland

RBA Round-up: 4 - 10 Sept Jon Dunn looks back at a week which brought us Britain's first twitchable Egyptian Nightjar www.rarebirdalert.co.uk/v2/Content/w...

This is a lab first... Egyptian Nightjar poop, neatly presented in cockle shells. A sprig of parsley would enhance the presentation. By the smell it's been feeding on beef casserole.

Look at ma sexy back garden badger! @naturespy.bsky.social #helarctos

A European Nightjar in Malta has been identified as an individual of the East Asian subspecies – and raises "significant possibility" that Britain's only record of Egyptian Nightjar, in Dorset in June 1984, could have been this form:

New paper with an unbelievable team of collaborators, led by Bob Flood. @scillypelagics.bsky.social A new subspecies of Cape Verde Storm Petrel Hydrobates jabejabe from São Tomé Island, Gulf of Guinea. Ostrich, 1–18. doi.org/10.2989/0030... @manuelschweizer.bsky.social

From @privateeyenews.bsky.social 😃

We've been working on subalpine warblers from this spring. Still a couple to do but: North Ronaldsay, 30/4: Western Calf of Man, 10/5: Western Isle of May, 28/5: Western Troswick, Shetland, 3/5: Western Portland, 12/5: Western Sumburgh Head, 9/6: Eastern @birdguides.bsky.social

We don't know who you are, anonymous donor, but we love you ❤️ Thank you to everyone who has supported our bird DNA work. www.justgiving.com/fundraising/...

For the last time 🥲 youtu.be/JNvQxyXu1Vc?...

Two Minke Whale lunge-feeding off Newtonhill this evening were quite the treat.

Al-altered images on birdwatching forums putting research at risk. “The idea that we could maybe use those [Facebook] photos to help us understand where species are in space and time is very difficult”, said @alexanderlees.bsky.social in the science journal Nature.

I'm not posting Odyssey memes because one must be wary of GIFs bearing Greeks.

The appropriately named Dark Green Fritillary on the clifftops today.

The immune system is just a myth invented by Big Pharma to make us buy more drugs. There, I said it.

A Quail calling in barley field at the back of Newtonhill. Today has been a good patch day.

With Download Festival then a trip to Scarborough I missed the last 2 weekends at Loirston Loch and while I was away *Great Crested Grebes moved in!!* My first at this site and less than annual in my 10K radius. Occasional fly-bys on seawatches. #winning

Code Red: Turtle Dove in my back garden!

Cheer my pot of self-seeded Northern Marsh Orchids

Happy Duck Necrophilia Day to all who celebrate

Plenty of Cuckoo action at Red Moss of Netherley this morning. 4 birds including this shifty-looking female, surveying the Mipits quietly.

The art world was shocked today by a new analysis of John Constable's iconic painting 'The Hay Wain'. Confocal X-ray imaging of the canvas revealed that Constable originally intended to portray the mill pond populated by cute little ghosts. #art #thehaywain

I too would risk it all for a landfill seedsnipe. Peak birding. www.independent.co.uk/news/world/a...

Found a long-dead Little Auk behind the dunes today. One from winter wrecks. A6 notebook for scale. #HolyIsland

Behold! My beautiful genotyping PCRs. So clean. Many beauty. Much science.

An old fashioned used-to-be Mealy/Common Redpoll in the garden today. Digi-binned.

In Llandudno hotels you have to pay the bill by passing biscuits through the window to the rent collectors.

I've never seen one before, but presume this monster is Queen of the Tree Bumblebee people. Found on our kitchen floor.

@tessaroo.bsky.social

Friday on the Great Orme, Llandudno. Sheep and Chough

Puffin offshore today!